


naptime

by FebruarySong



Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016)
Genre: Everybody Lives, Gen, idk how but they do
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-27
Updated: 2017-01-27
Packaged: 2018-09-20 04:38:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,473
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9476021
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FebruarySong/pseuds/FebruarySong
Summary: in which rogue one’s captain catches the flu and it’s up to the rest of the team to complete their toughest mission yet: get cassian andor to Rest





	

**Author's Note:**

> this was a response to a tumblr prompt that got a little out of hand omg

Echo Base on Hoth is cold all the time.

It’s for both practical and tactical reasons – heating the entire base requires a power supply that the Rebellion just doesn’t have, plus a heat signature that big on a frozen planet like Hoth would look suspicious. So it stays cold all the time, and everyone adjusts their fashion sense to include heavy coats indoors. 

Of course, this means a lot of stuffy noses. 

Everybody pretty much ignores it; maybe tissues  _ do _ become a slightly higher priority for supply runs, but otherwise there’s no point in drawing attention to it. So when Jyn hears Cassian sniffle (rather pitifully) across the table at lunch in the canteen one day, she honestly doesn’t think much of it.

“I’m not sick,” he says defensively even though she hasn’t even looked up from her plate of unappetizing rehydrated rations. 

“I never said you were,” she replies, but now that she  _ is _ looking, his nose might be a little red. 

But then she’s called away to consult on something, and she kind of forgets about it. It’s dinner time when she runs into Bodhi and he makes an offhand comment about Cassian sneezing so suddenly that it actually startled a radar tech enough to yell. 

“Do you think he’s sick?” Jyn asks.

“He said he isn’t,” Bodhi shrugs helplessly. 

But she doesn’t see Cassian again until the next morning when they pass each other in the frosty halls, Kaytoo hulking like a shadow behind him. Jyn wouldn’t have recognized him without the droid actually – he’s wearing an even fluffier parka than usual, plus a knit hat, heavy gloves, and a scarf bundled almost to his nose. 

“Going outside?” she asks casually, and he blinks bleary, bloodshot eyes at her. 

“What? No,” he replies in a voice that  _ could _ just be gruff. Or it could be hoarse. 

“Cassian, shouldn’t you stop by the medbay?”

“I’m not sick,” he says with a scornful sniff that completely loses its effect by gurgling. He’s still capable of a frown as he stalks away, though, as if the mere suggestion that he’s in anything but perfect health is not worth another minute of his time.

“Kaytoo,” Jyn says, stopping the droid before he follows. “What’s your diagnostic on Cassian’s current state of health?”

“He is running a fever of thirty-eight point four two seven degrees centigrade,” Kaytoo replies. 

“Right,” Jyn says, decision made, “find Bodhi and tell him to meet in my quarters. I’ll get Baze and Chirrut.”

“Why can’t we use the intercomm system?” Kaytoo sulks, clearly displeased being reduced to messenger droid.

“Because this is a  _ secret _ meeting,” Jyn says in a conspiratorial tone. Cassian once confided in her that Kaytoo is more like a ten-year-old boy than anything else, and now she tries to appeal to that aspect of his nature whenever she can. “Cassian  _ can’t _ know about it.” 

“I find subterfuge highly distasteful behaviour,” the droid sniffs, but he lumbers off in the direction of the hangar where Bodhi is likeliest to be. 

Fifteen minutes later and the entire team, minus Cassian, is gathered in Jyn’s cramped quarters. 

“What’s this about?” Baze rumbles, arms crossed and leaning in a corner. Chirrut is leaning against the desk, Kaytoo is near the door, and Bodhi and Jyn are sitting on the edge of the bed. 

“Cassian is sick,” Kaytoo announces, which is all the explanation necessary. There’s a palpable shift in the air as everyone reaches the same conclusion: this is going to be a nightmare.

“We have to convince him to rest,” Jyn says, although she’s not exactly sure how to go about it. The whole  _ nurturing _ thing isn’t really her specialty. 

“That will not be easy,” Chirrut says. 

“Just put a sedative in his food,” Baze shrugs. 

(On reflection, is  _ nurturing  _ really a specialty for any of them?)

“Don’t even think about it,” says Kaytoo. The droid is a bit of a mimic, and this phrase is his new favourite ever since he heard Cassian growl it a week ago when Jyn tried to take his cupcake at dinner. (He ended up splitting the cupcake with her.)

“Kay’s right,” Bodhi says. “Cap will never trust us again if we drug him.”

“He won’t even admit that he’s sick,” Jyn says. 

“What a child,” Baze mutters under his breath, although everybody knows that he’s as fond of the captain as he is of anybody. 

“So we wear him out,” Chirrut says as if it’s the most obvious thing in the world. At their confused silence, he elaborates, “When children don’t want to take a nap, you let them play until they wear themselves out. Most of the time, they fall asleep on their own.” 

Bodhi is nodding thoughtfully, and Jyn can kinda see the logic. Even Kaytoo isn’t offering a tactically superior option. 

So that’s exactly what they do. After spending a little time fine-tuning their plans, they split up in order to divide and conquer. Bodhi is up first, since he’s easily the nicest of them all and they might as well start slow. 

“Hey Cap, how are you feeling?” he asks when he ‘accidentally’ runs into Cassian a little later. (Maybe he had been loitering outside Cassian’s first meeting of the day. Maybe.)

“Just fine,” Cassian says suspiciously even as he attempts to disguise a sniffle as clearing his throat.

“Great,” Bodhi nods without missing a beat even though he’s suddenly uneasy that Cassian is onto them. “Got a couple minutes to look over the repairs I did on my X-wing? I’m not as familiar with the specs as I’d like and I’d kill for a second opinion.” 

It’s kind of a lie; Bodhi knows his X-wing inside out and the repairs are absolutely sound, but he did sorta sabotage his own handiwork a couple minutes ago just to give them something to do. Besides, Cassian knows that Bodhi is still finding his feet with the other pilots. It’s not implausible for him to ask a familiar face for help, even if Cassian isn’t exactly a mechanic.

So fifteen minutes later they’ve got the guts of Bodhi’s X-wing strewn out on the hangar floor. Cassian really isn’t much help – he mostly just frowns at each part and periodically sucks in what little air he can get through his nose. Bodhi honestly can’t help but admire his obstinance in denying that he’s sick, and wonders if it’s borne from some kind of training to not give in to torture.

Almost an hour later, Cassian is flat on his back underneath the body of the X-wing trying to reconnect a power coupling when Bodhi nudges his foot. “I’ll take over, Cap, you’ve got a visitor.” 

Cassian drags himself out and looks up at Jyn, who is leaning against the wing. 

“Ready to be a self-defense dummy?” she asks nonchalantly, as if this has been on his schedule for weeks. (He doesn’t need to know that Kaytoo took some liberties with his schedule this morning.)

“What?” he says, that wrinkle between his brows appearing. It's almost painful to watch how slowly the neurons in his brain are firing. 

“Yeah, for that course I agreed to teach to the new recruits,” she shrugs. “You said you’d be my partner. If you’re nice, I might even let you win a time or two.”

Flirting is still kinda new for both of them, and she makes a mental note to wait until he’s not drowning in his own mucus to attempt it again. He just blinks owlishly at her with his mouth a little open since he clearly can’t breathe through his nose anymore. 

“Unless you don't feel up to it, of course,” she says, half a challenge and half offering a means of escape. If he would just  _ admit _ that he's sick…

“I'm fine,” he grunts as he stands up. “Where is this class?” 

And Jyn has to give him credit – he’s an able partner in the demonstrations, and helpfully clarifies some of her explanations of holds and blocks when the new recruits start to look confused. Still, once the hour-long class is over, she watches his soldier posture deflate into miserable droopiness when he thinks no one is looking. 

Right on cue, Chirrut appears. “Come spar with me, Captain,” he says, gesturing to one of the empty training rings. 

“I just finished teaching a class,” Cassian says apologetically. Then sniffles.

“That just means you’re warmed up,” Chirrut shoots back with that calm grin, and Jyn kinda feels sorry for Cassian because honestly, she went easy on him. 

He probably senses the eminent ass-whooping too, since he hesitates as his feverish mind tries and fails to cobble together an excuse. Chirrut doesn’t give him much of an opportunity to protest, anyway; just heads into the center of the ring and settles into a loose ready stance. Cassian’s shoulder slump a millimeter more in resignation, and he peels off the jacket that he had just shrugged on.

Twenty minutes later, Cassian has been knocked flat on his back exactly six times. He’s also had a coughing fit exactly six times. Jyn stuck around for the first couple times, but once she realized just how serious Chirrut was in the whole “wear out the wayward child before naptime” thing, she couldn’t take it anymore and left. 

The seventh time, Cassian is practically hacking up a lung and he just lays helplessly on the ground until he can get his breath back. When Chirrut offers him a hand and drags him to his feet, he sees Baze giving them a baleful look from the edge of the ring.

“Are you done abusing our captain yet, Chirrut?” he asks in a flat tone.

“I wasn’t abusing him,” Chirrut protests.

“All the same, I think I’ve had enough sparring for one day,” Cassian says, his voice rasping across his ravaged throat. 

“Good,” Baze says, thumping his on the shoulder as he passes, “you’re just in time to help me offload those artillery rounds that came in this morning.” 

No one would dream of calling Cassian Andor disloyal to the Rebel cause, but a look very close to mutinous crosses his face. It’s quickly followed by the five stages of grief as he rationalizes that no job is too menial for any member of the Rebellion, and accepts that a half hour of physical labour is in his future. 

So with one pitiful snuffle, he follows Baze to the hangar bay where the shipment is waiting. 

He’s more than sniffling by the time they’ve unloaded a couple of the crates. Sure, the grav-repulsors mean that the crates hover a couple inches above the ground, but they’re still so heavy that it takes real effort to get them going and even more to navigate without crashing into anything. It’s easy work for Baze, but Cassian is huffing and puffing and moving very, very slowly.

This continues for another couple minutes until Baze sees Jyn staring him down from across the hangar, and sighs. “This is not going to work,” he mutters to himself just before doubling over one of the crates. “Ahhhh,” he monotones, louder this time, cocking half an eye at Cassian to make sure he’s noticed. “My  _ back _ .” 

This is the pièce de résistance, the crisis point upon which the rest of their efforts hang – and Baze barely sells it. He resisted the role from the start, until Bodhi pointed out that he’s the least suspicious if only  _ because _ of his reluctance. Cassian would never suspect Baze Malbus of faking a back injury.

And he’s certainly buying it now, judging from the concerned wrinkle between his brows. “Can you walk?” he asks, businesslike despite how obvious it is in his voice that his entire head is a solid brick of congestion.

“Help me to the medbay,” Baze grinds out, and his performance is probably generously supplemented by how much he hates play-acting. He throws in a couple half-hearted groans for good measure, but Cassian is too sick to be a discerning audience. 

Luckily for everyone involved, the medbay isn’t far away, and shortly thereafter Cassian and Baze have been relegated to being seated on a cot against the wall until a medic is available. Cassian leans his head back against the wall for a full minute, and Baze thinks maybe this was actually not as hard as it could have been. But then Cassian starts a little as if recollecting himself and moves to get up.

“Now that you’re settled–” he says, making it almost two inches off the cot before Baze clamps an iron fist on his forearm.

“ _ Sit _ ,” is all he growls, and Cassian crumples back down. Satisfied, Baze releases his death grip and closes his eyes. Maybe he just needs to set a good example for the boy. 

A couple of minutes go by silently (except for the agonizing rasp of Cassian’s breathing, which he still has to do through his mouth since his nose is so stuffed). Neither of them hear him come in, but eventually Chirrut settles on the other end of the cot. It must sort of relaxing to be ensconced shoulder-to-shoulder between the two of them, because Cassian doesn’t question Chirrut’s arrival. 

It’s another ten minutes before Jyn and Bodhi show up, perhaps overconfident that the strategy should have worked by now. Cassian looks thoroughly miserable with the effort of staying awake, but he’s still bitterly holding onto consciousness. 

“We heard Baze hurt his back,” Bodhi offers hastily as an explanation for their appearance. Jyn shoots a micro-expression of questioning at Baze, who just barely shakes his head. 

“Baze will be fine. How has your morning been?” Chirrut says, and the subtext is basically  _ tell a bedtime story for this poor child _ . 

“Well, um,” Bodhi begins haltingly, since he’s never told a bedtime story before (much less to a stubborn adult man), “it was pretty good I guess.”

“Breakfast was good,” Jyn points out, attempting to help. 

“It really was,” Bodhi agrees.

And maybe he really is completely worn out by a busy morning, or maybe it’s the soft hum of his team’s voices, or maybe he’s just finally still and warm for the first time, but Cassian slowly melts down onto Baze’s shoulder, and falls fast asleep. 

Kaytoo is the last to arrive, and he just makes it in time to see the tactical precision of Chirrut lifting Cassian’s feet onto the cot as Baze extracts himself and eases Cassian’s torso down so that he’s fully reposed. Jyn spreads a blanket up to his chin (he hasn’t stirred in the slightest during the entire interchange) while Bodhi flags down a medic to explain the situation.

And Kaytoo calculates that there is a ninety-seven point two six percent chance that this little found-family cares about Cassian Andor almost as much as he does. 


End file.
